Shambles
by Enigmatic Tathren
Summary: All Hunter wanted was to tell his friend one thing. But now Shawn's gone, and destroying the arena doesn't quite make up for that.


**Disclaimer: I don't own anything. If I did, there would still be a certain Heartbreak Kid in the WWE.**

**A/N: I know this is a bit late, but it's taken me close to a week to actually be able to write this. Shawn Michaels was the reason why I started watching wrestling, and one of the few reasons why I stuck with it. He is my hero and I still can't believe that he's retired. So how do I deal with that? By writing, of course. And thus, this was born.**

Hunter was silent.

Maybe that should have been the first warning sign. After all, he was never quiet. He was always talking and joking with the other wrestlers, or getting into some sort of mischief with Shawn. Maybe that's why no one thought it was strange that he wasn't doing anything; without Shawn around as a partner-in-crime, maybe Hunter just lacked the drive to cause any real mayhem.

Maybe they all thought he was still in shock, still trying to get used to not having Shawn around- because everyone else was. The locker room seemed a bit quieter, a bit sadder, without him in there to liven things up. Everyone was half-expecting him to come bursting in, wanting to know how the heck they planned on making it through their matches if they were as dead as they looked.

But he wasn't going to show up anymore. They had all known the outcome of the Streak vs. Career match at Wrestlemania before the bell even rung. All that was left was to get used to the absence of the Heartbreak Kid.

Hunter, it seemed, didn't want to do that.

No one commented when he grabbed an extra ice pack after his match, only to have no one to give it to. No one noticed when he grabbed the DX shirt first, before realizing his mistake and setting it aside. And no one heard him almost ask Shawn something, before remembering that his friend wasn't there.

"Just give him time," they all said when they thought he couldn't hear them. "He'll get over it soon enough."

XXXXX

When the first shrieks were heard from the Diva's locker room, no one suspected anything. There were always spiders to be found in the arenas. The Diva's just got the short end of the stick with a locker room that had a nest of them.

No one noticed Hunter's smirk as he watched the girls run by, racing towards the bathroom to finish getting changed there.

When the coffee pot shattered in catering, spilling the luckily lukewarm drink all over Sheamus's expensive suit, a few people started murmuring in suspicion but still they kept the incident quiet. Sheamus wasn't liked by many people. _If_ someone had rigged the pot, it could have been anyone.

The fact that he had interrupted Hunter's farewell message to Shawn was purely coincidental.

It wasn't until the green spray-paint started showing up that everyone had to admit that they all knew who was at fault. There was only one person who would have done it- not that anyone was willing to talk to him.

XXXXX

Hunter leaned up against the side of the building, staring at the sky and taking no notice of the cool wind that was blowing by. He had thought that some good old-fashioned mischief in honor of Shawn would make things easier, but if anything it only made everything worse. Nothing was the same without the Heartbreak Kid there, and that was a tough pill for him to swallow.

"I knew I'd find you here."

Hunter didn't even bother glancing over at Mark as the other man moved to stand next to him. "Yeah? And why's that?"

"Because it would be too hard to see the chaos inside and know that he didn't cause it."

Hunter closed his eyes and tried to push Mark's words away. The older man was right, as usual, but the Game didn't want to admit it. "Just go away," he finally said. "Please. I'd rather be alone."

"We both know that's not true."

"And we both know that it's not _you_ I want to be with right now."

Mark chuckled. "Touché."

The two fell into a surprisingly comfortable silence and Hunter had to admit that, though he hadn't wanted him to stick around, he didn't really mind the Deadman being there. Mark and Shawn had been close as well, or at least as close as they could be while being on different brands. They had been the last of a dying race of wresters, and now it was just Mark; the older wrestler was probably the only other person to really miss Shawn like he did.

"You gonna talk about it, or do you plan on staying out here all night?" Mark finally said.

"There's nothing to talk about."

"Are you going to use that excuse when your wife asks you about the spiders in the Diva's locker room? Or the suit that you ruined? Or the fines they're going to get for the spray-paint on the walls of the arena?"

"There's nothing to talk about because none of it meant anything!" Hunter snapped. "It was pointless, all of it, because Shawn won't know what happened! He won't be here to laugh about it or comment on how pathetic my attempts were, so what does it matter?"

Mark remained silent, letting him vent and rage as much as he needed to.

Hunter sighed, the anger slowly draining out of him. "Do you remember when I first came to the WWE?" he asked tiredly.

"Yeah. They stuck you with that Connecticut Blueblood gimmick that everyone expected to fall flat on its face."

Hunter managed a weak grin. "Yeah, well, it was thanks to Shawn that it didn't. Everyone knows that he stuck up for me in those early days, that it was because of Shawn that I wasn't fired after the first few months. But not a lot of people know that, until the day he lost to you, he kept sticking up for me."

"Typical Shawn. Overprotective until the end, right?"

"Right, but… Well, I always meant to thank for him that, or do something to pay him back. He told me once that he didn't expect anything in return, but I still wanted to do _something_, y'know? Every time he'd tell one of the new guys to stop talking trash about me marrying Stephanie, I'd think _Gee, I should thank him for that_ but I never did. And now I lost my chance, because he's not going to be around to do it anymore."

"What does this have to do with destroying the arena, though?"

"Last Monday, before Sheamus attacked me, I meant to tell him everything that I just told you. I wanted to thank him for everything he did for me, and I wanted to promise to him that I'd keep raising hell in the back for as long as I could, just so people couldn't forget him."

He chuckled, but it sounded hollow. "Do you know what the only thing I'm going to be able to think of whenever I think of that night now? Not Shawn leaving, but everything I meant to do. The things I meant to tell him, the promises I meant to make. Because even if I were to call him up now it wouldn't be the same. The Heartbreak Kid has left the building, and he isn't coming back."

Mark stared up at the sky, giving Hunter time to wipe his eyes and act like he was never crying. "There was something I always wanted to thank him for too," he finally said. "I wanted to thank him for not giving up on me, even when everyone else in this business thought it was time for me to hang up my boots. He called me one day and said to me, _Mark, if you think you're going to retire now, think again. If you stop wrestling then I figure its time I stop too, and I'm not ready to call it quits yet_."

"Typical Shawn, right?"

Mark grinned. "Right. But you know what? If you talk to the people back in that arena, they're all going to tell you stories exactly like that, because that's just the kind of person Shawn was." He dug his phone out of his pocket and tossed it to Hunter. "Call him. Just because he's left the building, doesn't mean he won't want to hear about the chaos you caused inside it. Besides, he'll probably be the only one to find it amusing."

Hunter laughed, and quickly dialed Shawn's number as Mark retreated back inside the building. "Shawn? Yeah, it's me, Hunter. I have something to tell you…"


End file.
